by Dave Ferraro
It was hard to believe that Shanna had never met a hunter up until she’d met Felicia. On-line, they had seemed like shadows or smoky figures that would disperse when she reached toward them. They had been eager in pointing others in the right direction, but closed off and distant, with little humanity shining through their generalized encouragement and mutual assistance. They could have just as easily been dreams rather than people. Until Valor had contacted her. And now there were two of them in her life, in the flesh with personalities and emotions attached.
“Thanks, Jordan,” Felicia said gratefully as the guy helped her up to her feet.
Shanna clambered up the fallen bridge just behind Felicia, and Jordan met her with a firm grip, nearly yanking her to her feet.
“Thanks,” Shanna mumbled, her eyes dancing over his frame. He was a really pretty boy. Someone who belonged in an Abercrombie & Fitch catalogue, not the scene of a massacre. Being lean, he bragged a swimmer’s build with broad shoulders and defined arm muscles, thus the yanking to her feet. Despite the arrogant, pretty boy facade, he seemed very genuine and warm - a nice guy who bestilled her intimidation with a disarming smile.
“This is Shanna,” Felicia introduced her.
Jordan looked Shanna over, an eyebrow raised in question. “Hmmm...could it be? Another hunter?”
“Demon hunter,” Felicia confirmed.
“Well, all right,” Jordan said, regarding Shanna warmly. “I don’t think we have one of those in our collection yet. And it’s always nice to meet a fellow hunter. Especially one so beautiful.”
“Careful, Jordan,” Felicia warned. “You’re liable to make a girl jealous one of these days.”
“I’m only being polite,” Jordan insisted with a wink in Shanna’s direction.
“Do you hunt…shape-shifters?” Shanna asked.
Jordan shrugged. “Among other things. I’m a werewolf hunter by trade, but I had a special interest in this case. When Felicia told me about this place, I thought I’d scope things out, maybe wreak some havoc. Looks like I’m too late.”
“They locked the place up pretty tight,” Felicia concurred. “We fought our way out, but a lot of people died in there.”
“And are dying,” Shanna added.
Jordan glanced at her. “There are people still in there, fighting them off?”
“Of course there are,” Felicia said. “But it’s hopeless. They’re probably almost done with the meal by now.”
Jordan scoffed. “Are you kidding me? If there are still people alive, there’s still something to be done.”
Shanna perked up and glanced over at Felicia, who looked appalled.
“There’s no getting back in there if you want to come back out,” Felicia informed him. “It’s hell inside. More than a dozen shifters and vamps and…it’s just a war zone. I was about to call a clean-up crew to cleanse the place.”
Looking away, Shanna’s eyes were drawn to the parking lot, dark and still full of cars. A chain had been drawn over the entrance with an “At Capacity” sign dangling from it to ward off any latecomers who may try to sneak in. It was a lonely scene, she decided, her eyes dancing over a Chevy Cavalier with plastic Mardi Gras beads hanging from the rear view mirror. Most of the drivers of these vehicles would never sit behind the steering wheel again. A whole parking lot full. She averted her eyes before she was tempted to count the number of cars.
“Well,” Jordan said, opening a case at his feet. “I’m going in there. You can call a clean-up crew if you want. If I’m not out by the time they get here, I’m probably dead anyhow. But I’m not letting them slip through my fingers without a fight again.”
“Again?” Shanna echoed, avoiding looking too closely at a nearby Ford Taurus that may or may not have belonged to Kelly.
Jordan pulled a machete out of his bag, admiring it openly. “I’ve hunted these particular bastards for over a year now. They call themselves The Crimson Rope. They always do this: set up shop quick, relying on word-of-mouth and posters usually, so it’s hard to know where they’re going to hit next. They open, they have a massacre, they leave. A clean-up crew isn’t going to get here soon enough. I need to stop as many of them as I can now.”
The Friday the Thirteenth soundtrack echoed through Shanna’s head as Jordan hefted the machete over his shoulder. All he needs is a hockey mask, she mused.
“If you can keep the bridge hanging down there until the crew arrives, it would be much appreciated,” Jordan said, strapping a sheath over his shoulder and confining his machete to its cell. He walked over to the edge of the bridge and gazed down into the pit, his eyes running slowly over the eyes of the dead naga.
“Wait,” Shanna found herself saying. “I’ll come with you. You could use someone to show you the way.”
Felicia threw her hands up in the air. “Are you fucking kidding me?”
Jordan shrugged, a grin threatening to overcome his stoic expression. “You can come if you want. But you don’t have to be a hero.”
“Neither do you,” Shanna retorted.
Just then, a figure burst out of the same shaft that Shanna and Felicia had crawled out of, followed by another and another.
One of them, a girl in her early twenties, began to scream when she saw the naga’s corpse.
“For god’s sake,” Jordan murmured, swinging down the bridge to help them out.
Shanna looked back at Felicia and screamed herself as a hulking creature descended from the sky just behind her, a dark shape against the dark sky. It flew by them, low enough to touch, before it climbed the sky again to circle the club overhead, but not before dropping something near Felicia, something that expanded its bulk very quickly until Shanna stood gaping up at a blue scaly armadillo, its shoulders standing six feet from the ground. Its beady eyes assessed them for a moment before it shrank in upon itself, into the shape of a perfect ball, and began to propel itself in their direction.
Swallowing hard, Shanna watched the ball roll in a blur of blue, the dim light of the parking lot flashing off its plates as it charged straight for Felicia, who dove out of its way like it were a charging bull. As it passed her, a hand raked out with sharp talons, just missing shredding Felicia’s face as she tumbled away.
Shanna wasn’t sure how to proceed and was taken by surprise when the ball changed direction and headed for her. With the spikes surrounding the pit behind her, Shanna was forced to run or be crushed into them by the weight of the armadillo, which rolled toward her at an extraordinary speed. She pulled out her dagger and instantly realized how little it would help her in the present situation. The creature was protected all around with plates as big around as her hand, that were surely able to deflect a knife throw as easily as if she were throwing wads of paper at it. She also realized that she wouldn’t be able to outrun it for long. Her best bet was to jump out of the way when it got close enough, as Felicia had, but when she came to this conclusion, it was already so close to her heels that she feared the second it would take to shift her body to jump to the side would be enough for it to gain her and crumple her beneath its weight, or at least, slash her to ribbons with its wicked-looking talon. And so out of desperation, she ran for the space between the bars that circled the pit, where the bridge had once stood.
The space was too narrow for the armadillo to maneuver, so it quickly broke off pursuit as she sailed through space, her hands groping desperately for something to grab onto to stop her fall. Her fingers closed around the rope of the dangling bridge and she abruptly stopped her descent with a tug that sent burning pain through her shoulder, and forced her to hit the wall hard, where her shoulder took another hit that caused her to suck air in between her teeth.
Jordan was cursing and climbed the bridge to her side. “Are you alright?” he demanded, looking her over anxiously.
Shanna was too winded to reply, but nodded and gestured up to where Felicia was still in combat with the shape-shifting armadillo.
Jordan seemed to understand a
nd climbed up and out of the pit to the other hunter’s assistance.
In a moment, Shanna had collected herself and was about to climb back up to help out her new friends when she noticed a dark figure flutter to the bottom of the pit gracefully. In the excitement of the armadillo’s attack, she’d forgotten about the figure that had been flying overhead. She quickly climbed down into the pit, where she was able to make the creature out to be a huge black raven that had landed near the three people that had escaped the club. It had quickly cornered them and was gazing at them like plump worms that had fallen into its nest.
Clenching her dagger tightly, Shanna sprinted across the distance that separated them and slashed at the bird the moment she was close enough. She wasn’t sure if she cut it; She felt plenty of feathers tear, but didn’t see any blood. It turned on her, sneering, blue eyes glaring. Ultimately, it slapped her with its tail feathers, shoving her forward amidst the other three cowering, terrified individuals. The other girl began to wail again.
Shanna slumped up against the wall as the bird stuck a rough gray talon out and gripped one of the men in hand. She stumbled to her feet as it squeezed him, his eyes bulging with the pressure. He screamed in agony as the talon gripped tighter, sank deep into his flesh. Shanna could swear she heard organs deflate as blood splurted up out of his mouth in short gurgles. One small bubble of blood appeared from out of his nose and floated into the air for a moment. It stalled in front of the screaming girl, like a puppeteer had stopped moving its string. Then it burst and the girl quieted, staring blankly at the space it had occupied, as if it had signaled the end of her performance.
By the time Shanna looked over at the raven again, it was eating something, having squeezed the man into two pieces. Blood was seeping across the ground to where the other guy and girl sat, holding each other desperately. Shanna edged over toward them slowly, keeping the cement wall to her back.
Upon her reaching them, the raven took a final bite out of a leg and threw the remainder of the lower body at the three of them. The girl didn’t even acknowledge the corpse, but the guy let out a scream. Shanna leapt forward with her dagger again, but the raven seemed prepared for her and just shoved her back again with a wing. She hit the wall with such force that she had to bend over to catch her breath. Then she noticed she’d dropped her dagger.
“Damn it,” she cursed. She looked over at the guy, his eyes wide with terror, and suddenly recognized him as Jeremy, the guy she’d danced with earlier. “Jeremy?”
He looked over at her, a glimmer of recognition crossing his face.
The reunion was short-lived however as the raven suddenly grew bored with the body it held and snatched the girl up in hand. The girl didn’t protest in the least as the raven took a huge bite out of her stomach with a beak full of sharp teeth. She began to gulp like a fish out of water, but swiftly stopped moving altogether, and the monster seemed to lose interest. A crimson waterfall poured from her body as the creature threw her remains at Shanna and Jeremy.
Shanna yelped in surprise as the body knocked them over and onto the ground. It was a lot heavier than it looked, especially with Jeremy and the other half-guy laying over her as well. Jeremy was screaming his head off while Shanna was doing her best to get out from under everyone. She was having no luck however because she kept slipping on the layer of blood that coated the ground.
The raven hovered over them then, watching, Shanna almost able to make out a smile.
“Oh, God!” Jeremy cried. “Get me out of here, please! Mom! Mom, help me! Help me, please!”
Shanna started to panic when she tried to get up again but found she couldn’t. Jeremy’s hysteria was beginning to rub off on her, her heart racing out of control, throbbing in her ears and threatening to burst from her chest.
The raven struck again and blood splattered Shanna’s face. She closed her eyes against it and cried out in protest, getting the warm iron-tasting liquid in her mouth for her trouble. She wiped the blood from her face and saw that Jeremy’s head was no longer upon his shoulders. She suddenly found herself screaming and scrambling in vain to get out from under the bodies. She managed to get the half-man off of her, but it only served to allow the girl’s body to slump over her chest, spilling out a stomachful of intestines. Shanna dropped any semblance of courage she had left at that moment and shrieked like she was a little girl again, watching helplessly as brownish bowel-smelling liquid joined the blood that was soaking her clothes and hair. She suddenly pictured Carrie in her mind, covered in pig’s blood. Then Kelly, her throat ripped out. Then her parents, blood soaking the carpet around them. Her life was full of death and now at her own death, only more death swam before her eyes. She cried out suddenly, a feral, guttural snarl of a cry. “Damn you, God! I hate you, you asshole! I hate you for this! I want you to die, you stupid, sorry excuse for a god! God, damn you!”
She stopped then and lay still as the raven watched her warily and she awaited her death. Intestines settled onto her neck, blood trickled down her legs. She simply stared into the raven’s cold eyes and willed it to finish her off.
Then Jeremy’s body shifted and the silver lightning bolt necklace that had been held in place by his head (when it had been attached) landed in her outstretched hand. She looked down at it, an “o” of surprise stretching over her face.
The raven lunged its head in for the kill then, beak open wide, exposing its deadly teeth, its slimy tongue and the blood stains upon it.
Shanna moved quickly, letting her body take over on instinct. She found herself forcing the lightning bolt as deep into the roof of the monster’s mouth as she could, with all her might. She wasn’t sure if it was going be enough until she saw the bolt’s end punch through the raven’s left eye socket, popping its teal orb. She let out a deep breath as the raven collapsed quickly and melted over her. It tingled a little bit as it receded into itself around her and eventually disappeared.
A shaky breath escaped Shanna and she suddenly found herself sobbing uncontrollably. It came from deep within her, like she’d broken something and suddenly couldn’t shut it off. Tears slid down her cheeks and into her mouth. Some slid down her chin and onto the bodies before her. She didn’t know why she was crying or for whom; she just let the tears come.
Before she knew it, Jordan was helping her up and Shanna was too exhausted to try to figure out how long she’d been sitting there. But she gave herself up to his direction completely as he led her up the bridge and out of Hell.
Chapter Four